Wet Work
by Gone2Far
Summary: Two words, two friends, a world of regret. A conversation between Steve and Danny during one dark night.


**Here's an angsty one shot. It's dark and there are no cats in it. Wrote it quite some time ago but wasn't sure about letting it loose. I don't usually write tags but, for whatever reason, the term stuck with me. Spoilers for 3:9 'Ha'awe Make Loa'.**

**Reviews would be nice.**

**Disclaimer: No money made from this. Just airing out the darkness.**

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Wet Work

It was past ten p.m. and the large space was dark save for the glow of the desk lamp in the glass-walled office in the corner. Danny's shoes made an echoing tap as he strode across the black granite floor toward it.

As he grew closer, he could see his partner leaned back in the chair turned toward the window. He sat staring out at the velvety night. Though the detective had made no effort at stealth and the man was pretty much impossible to sneak up on, Steve made no indication he was aware of his friend's approach.

"Steven?"

There was no answer.

"You okay?"

Again, no answer.

The tall man's withdrawal into silence and dark musings would happen occasionally; usually after one of his team had come close to leaving this earth at the hands of someone he thought he should have been able to stop sooner. The SEAL would take it as his own failure particularly if an innocent civilian was injured or killed. After working with the man for only a week, Danny had come to realize that Steve pretty much thought it was his duty to protect everyone; no matter the cost to himself.

Sometimes that cost was dear. The evidence of it was the scene that greeted the detective as he came closer. The isolation was almost a physical barrier; as though his partner had surrounded himself with Plexiglas walls; visible from a distance but never reachable, never touchable.

Considering Steve's turbulent history, Danny thought he himself would have lost it long ago but the tall man would just withdraw and regroup and then plunge on as though nothing had happened but Danny knew it took its toll.

After that first meeting in a dusty garage only days after John McGarrett's murder, they'd become friends, brothers actually. It hadn't been easy. Danny had been more than unhappy when dragooned into the Governor's Special Task Force by someone he considered an arrogant SOB with a death wish.

Each of them had to first surrender their preconceptions about what to expect from partners. Danny had to give up the expectation that what he'd learned about police procedure would be the norm when, more likely, it would be the exception. Steve had to give up the expectation that his authority as the head of the task force would never be questioned – specifically by his back-up - one Detective Daniel Williams.

They'd somehow made it work.

The major flaw in the relationship, if one could call it that, was that while one partner, bidden or unbidden, expressed everything on his mind; the other hung onto his thoughts as though a hoarder of same even when it would be wisest to air them. Like now.

"Look, if you don't talk to me, I'm going to rat you out to Kalakaua. We both know it's to be avoided at all costs. I'd rather not do that. It would be cruelty to animals."

The man facing the window let out a small huff of amusement but then continued to brood in silence before audibly inhaling then blowing out a breath and swiveling his chair toward his patiently waiting partner. Briefly pursing his lips, McGarrett stared back at his friend as if trying to make a decision before speaking. It was a look of evaluation. It was one with which Danny was familiar though he hadn't seen it in a while. When they'd first met, Steve almost never said anything without weighing how much he was about to say may reveal about himself no matter the subject. Danny could never decide if it was natural paranoia or something learned from years of a life lived in covert ops. Eventually, the detective had concluded it was perhaps a little of both.

"I've got all night Steven." said the detective as he took a seat in one of the chairs in front of the SEAL's desk and rather formally folded his hands in his lap, shifting slightly on the upholstered seat to get comfortable. He really did intend to wait out the stubborn man until he said something or physically threw him out.

"Go home Danny."

"Nope. I'm sticking to you like a barnacle until you spill what's bothering you. You didn't pick up your phone when I called . . . say twenty or thirty times. I left messages for you. You might want to delete the last few. I was really frustrated by then."

Dark tired eyes fastened on the seated detective. There was something in them that Danny couldn't yet read and he was extremely good at reading his partner. He'd had to become so because the man wasn't the most verbal guy he'd ever met and it was good to have a heads up when the hyperactive asshole decided to drag him into something that required he check the clip in his gun.

Knowing his overly protective 2IC wouldn't be leaving until he had some sort of answer, the SEAL shook his head resignedly before asking, "Danny, you've heard the term 'wet work' right?"

"Yeah, of course. Why?"

"Did you know it's a term originally used by Russian mobsters and later the KGB. It finally became slang for the CIA."

"Pray tell why are you giving me this history lesson Steven?"

Ignoring the question the tall man continued, "The term refers to how messy it may be to assassinate someone, you know, blood and such."

Danny only nodded silently, kind of freaked by the detached and pedantic way in which his partner was explaining it; as though it was part of a class titled 'Beginning Assassination 1-A'.

There was another spell of silence. The room, lit only by the small lamp that sat on the obsessively neat desk, was veiled in darkness that seemed to press in as though it had stolen through the window to envelope them in its isolation; seal them in this moment.

Steve had leaned slightly forward; face becoming a bit more visible in the light reflecting off the glass surface of his desk. Eyes like night itself now looked directly into the pale eyes of the detective. "You know, Martin Cordova could have executed me out there in the middle of nowhere. He had a gun to my head and he could have just blown my brains out and kept on going. He had a good chance to get away."

Danny didn't think an answer was needed. He was just going to listen to Steve riff. He sat quietly and listened to the soft, low, voice coming from the near darkness; knowing that in his friend's life there'd been too many barely missed meetings with the Grim Reaper. Danny was sure he wasn't even aware of many if not most of those moments since pretty much everything about his partner's life up to this point was 'classified' and the reticent man didn't necessarily share even the things that weren't.

"He chose me to end his life. He handed me back my SIG and told me to put one between his eyes." Steve brought his index finger up to touch his own forehead in what Danny assumed was the gesture used by Cordova. "I think he didn't even have a doubt I wouldn't."

"Where are you going with this Steven?" asked Danny almost shivering at Steve's eerie emotionless recounting.

"What made him recognize in me the fact that I could pull the trigger as easily as he himself had probably done dozens if not hundreds of times? What made him know that wet work was what I'd been trained to do? How did he know it's what I'd done for duty and county more times than I want to remember?"

"You didn't pull the trigger on Cordova" reminded Danny, shaking off the chill. "You turned him over to HPD so that he could die in prison instead of by a bullet that you could have put into his head. It was a decision you made."

"Yeah, but it would have been easy to end someone like that. Don't know why I didn't actually." said the tall man almost to himself and with a mildly puzzled look on his lean face. "But for whatever reason, Cordova recognized I was capable of it. He recognized another creature like himself."

"You're not like him. If you were, we wouldn't be sitting here having this discussion - without even a beer in our hands I might add."

They sat in silence for another few minutes. Danny could almost feel the vibration of the grinding thoughts in his partner's troubled head.

"I mean, how did he know?" asked the SEAL; reiterating his question.

"I don't have an answer for you babe. But I do know it frightens the crap out of you to compare yourself to a hired killer - doesn't it?"

There was no reply from the tall man.

"It's okay Steven. You don't have to answer that because despite your usual taciturnity, I can read you like a book."

"Taciturnity?" At hearing the use of one of the vocabulary building words Danny seemed so fond of, the SEAL's mouth turned up ever so slightly at the corners but the change didn't register in his eyes.

"You know, if it didn't bother you, there'd be no conflict to resolve."

"Wet work doesn't bother me Danny. I can kill people in more ways than you can possibly imagine. I'm very good at it actually. I don't enjoy it but it doesn't bother me."

Danny felt another chill roll through him. He'd seen Steve swiftly and methodically dispatch those who'd made the fatal error of thinking that harming innocent civilians and/or law enforcement officers was acceptable. They'd rarely survived that poor decision.

In the aftermath, as the smell of blood and cordite was strong and smoke swirled lazily upward, his friend's eyes would be flat and cold as he surveyed those left lying in his wake. Even for a tough Jersey cop who'd seen almost everything one human being can inflict on another it was unsettling it didn't seem to unduly affect him.

The detective found it hard to reconcile that, Steve, the man who'd become his daughter's beloved uncle; who'd been almost unhinged with worry when his partner had been near death with sarin poisoning; beside himself with anxiety when Mary Ann had been kidnapped was the same man capable of such efficient destruction and showed no outward emotion when the job was done.

Danny could only restate his previous answer, "You didn't do it babe. You made the right decision."

"Maybe I thought killing him was too good for the bastard."

"Does it even matter at this point Steven? You stopped. You took your finger off the trigger."

"But why Danny? What was the reason! Was there something in me that finally clicked? Something that told me it's wrong to execute people? I've never felt anything like that. I've never felt the slightest twinge at taking a Chey-Tac up to high ground so that I could sight on a target and just fucking blow someone's brains out. It was a job . . . like mowing the grass or washing the car for chrissakes!"

Danny physically flinched but the strange thought that flitted through the detective's mind was: _Why doesn't Steve have a gardener?_ then mentally chastised himself for letting his mind wander because he really didn't want to contemplate what he'd been asked.

"People change." was all he could think to say. "Obviously, it bothers you now or we wouldn't even be having this conversation."

There was only the sound of a tired exhalation as an answer.

"Maybe finally having an ohana has changed you. You were practically raised by an institution. I have a feeling that your parents, much as you revere them, weren't really that emotionally demonstrative to begin with. Despite the fact your dad loved you; it's what made him able to send you and Mary away to keep you safe. It's what made your mom able to abandon her family. There is that disconnect between thinking and feeling. Neither of them could fathom that it would nearly destroy the two of you. That it would make you distance yourself from emotion of all sorts as self-protection."

Steve mused aloud, "Sometimes I wonder if I should just go back to active duty. There's actually a use for me there."

"And there's not here?" pointedly asked the blonde

"For people like me? You know what I mean."

"This world would be a much sadder place if there were no people like you."

"Yeah, right, we make it so much more warm and fuzzy." huffed Steve into the darkness

"Steven, I was lucky enough to have parents who told me they loved me despite everything I did to make myself unlovable. Whose approval wasn't hinged on performance of duty. You're parents had high expectations for you but not as high as the ones you have for yourself. As you once told me, your mother's death made you the man you are. Even, as it turned out, she wasn't really dead; the damage had already been done."

Right about now, Danny hated both Doris and John McGarrett. Though they thought they were doing the right thing, leaving their son to essentially figure out life for himself while living in a system designed to reward perfection and weed out failure had been damaging. Would they have wanted their child to acquire perfect skills to kill other human beings? Actually, after meeting Doris McGarrett, Danny wasn't so sure the answer would be a resounding 'no'.

It was so wrong. Steve had been screwed from practically the beginning. And this was the result; a man who'd become a virtual killing machine and realized one day that he wasn't. He was only a very human and very sad young man.

"Again, you numbskull, if you were truly like him, you probably wouldn't even be having this . . . conflict. I know you as a caring human being who'll take the time to make sandcastles with a ten-year-old child. Who can make people light up at the prospect of spending time with you."

Said McGarrett with a soft snort. "Haven't noticed anyone lighting up over anything except when Gracie comes into the room then you're like a two-hundred-watt bulb."

"Well, for whatever reason I still can't fathom, Catherine glows when you're around and you've got it wrong babe; Gracie _is_ the light. I only get to bask in it every other weekend when I have custody and she gets to visit."

"Still hard to imagine your DNA could produce something so perfect." said Steve, mood seeming to lighten slightly.

"Just because you were assembled somewhere in a secret government facility doesn't mean that others don't possess the right genes to make perfect little girls." Then shifting in his chair he came back to one of Steve's previous statements. "You know you can't go back to active duty. I'd be in deep shit because Gracie would never forgive me for letting her Uncle Steve leave the islands. "

There was a longer silence this time. Danny waited patiently for his partner to begin speaking. It took a while but he heard a sigh in the darkness and then the squeak of a chair as it was rolled a little closer to the pool of light that spread outward from the lamp.

"Does it make me less of a machine if I admit that I'd miss you and Gracie and the rest of the team too?" asked Steve in an almost shy manner.

"You were never a machine babe. That's only what I said to get under your skin to punish you for whatever your transgressions against me were at the time. If you are a machine, somebody obviously put the parts together all wrong. The place that should have a cold piece of metal has a heart instead."

This time, there was a real if faint smile on the chiseled features. "You've been watching those Disney movies with Gracie again huh?"

Ignoring the dig, Danny continued, "When I said the parts were put together all wrong, I meant to elaborate about your head being placed up your ass instead of where it should be on your neck."

"That was unkind Daniel."

"If the sheet metal fits"

"You want to go for a beer?"

"You buying?"

"Yeah I'll pop for the first round at least."

"Don't forget your wallet."

"That's cold brah."

"No, nothing about either one of us is cold Steven. Cool maybe but not cold."

"Cool according to your ten-year old daughter?" laughed the SEAL - the sound welcome.

"Nah, that was last year when we were lumped in with Hello Kitty glitter stickers and watermelon lip-gloss. I'm afraid we've been replaced by that Bieber kid."

"I guess we've had our fifteen minutes, huh?"

"At least in the eyes of a ten-year-old girl."

Steve just chuckled softly. He had no words for the feeling that bubbled up from somewhere within him. From a well he hadn't even been aware was there until he found a new family in the members of his team.

"The Ice-man Thaweth, babe."

"Really? You're going to go with that one?" said Steve as he stood to gather his keys, phone and wallet.

"You recognized the take on the title? Very good Steven. I knew you were smarter than you look."

"Fuck off Danny." said McGarrett without being able to stifle a small laugh.

"Okay but only after we get a beer. I hear the Happy Hibiscus is a good place to unwind and there are some very available women who hang out there." After pausing a second he added, "Available only for me of course because I don't want to be responsible for Cath committing mayhem on your anatomy if you stray and she finds out."

"Keys?" asked Steve as he held out his hand toward his partner

"Make sure you have your wallet, Rambo."

"Yeah, yeah. I only forgot it that one time. Are you ever gonna lay off?" said the SEAL in mock annoyance.

"Are you ever gonna let me drive my own car?"

When no answer was immediately forthcoming he said, "Then, no, Steven."

With a bout of familiar bickering, the two men left the office to sit on barstools and solve the problems of the world together. No wet work required.

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**Thanks for reading. Would love to hear your opinion on this.**


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